Riding the Red Horse

by Christopher Nuttall

  WAR CRIMES

  by Benjamin Cheah

  “Look at the Vashies. They’re fish in a barrel.”

  “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

  A living tsunami of aliens surged through the street, closing in on an apartment building. Four tiny figures scrambled about on the roof, highlighted with green carets. The camera swiveled, the central crosshair focusing on a cluster of Vash jumping out of a truck. All were armed.

  “You see those lizzies jumping out the truck?”

  “Yep. Engaging.”

  Red carets blinked into existence, framing the truck and the aliens around them.

  “Fletchers out!”

  Streams of white smoke obscured the camera, terminating in small bursts. Storms of flechettes tore the Vash apart.

  “Good shoot!”

  “Roge-o. Use smart shells on the rest of the bastards. Try not to hit our guys.”

  “When have I ever?”

  The camera abruptly jinked right and aligned itself with the road. The alien mob was pounding on the doors of the building, a roaring wave of inhuman fury. Then the camera panned up to show four men leaning over the side of the roof, dropping small objects into the mob, and ducking quickly back.

  The street vanished in smoke and fire.

  “Holy shit! What the hell…”

  The soldiers repeated their action. Again, multiple explosions tore through the mob.

  The dirty smoke cleared. Broken, bleeding bodies filled the street. The Vash still standing froze or fled. The soldiers reappeared on the roof edge and opened fire, inspiring those that still could to run away.

  “Holy shit!”

  The airscreen winked out. Josephine Anders set her holobracer aside. Seated across the table, Lieutenant Desh Horvan clenched his fists. His cheeks were flushed with anger.

  “That’s it? That’s the ‘proof’ Andrew Nash has?”

  “That’s the meat of the vid.”

  “How the hell did he get guncam footage?”

  “An anonymous whistleblower passed it to Nash and Transparency Interstellar.”

  The lieutenant's eyebrows furrowed. A scowl spread across his face. Standing, he slammed his palms on the table. “That’s fucking treason!”

  Anders winced. “TransInt is calling the whistleblower a hero for exposing war crimes.”

  He sighed. Sat back down. “Hero my ass. They weren’t there.”

  “Yes, but he’s using the video as proof that you killed hundreds of innocents.”

  “That's bullshit! I was cleared by the court-martial.”

  She steepled her fingers. “Nash is calling for a re-trial.”

  “Won't happen. Double-jeopardy. Nash knows that, he's just chasing publicity.” He sighed. “So why are you here? You believe him?”

  “I’m a reporter. I’m just here to find out what happened.”

  He snorted. “Really. Just one question, reporter: I saw one of your pieces. Why did you call it 'The Confluence Massacre'?”

  She shifted awkwardly on the hard wooden bench. “Well, that’s what people back home are calling it.”

  Horvan snorted, so loudly a passing soldier stopped and looked at them. The lieutenant laughed and waved him on.

  “Did I say something funny?”

  He grinned humorlessly. His eyes were dark with cynicism. “Everybody’s calling it a ‘massacre’ because TransInt branded it that way. I was there. And that vid Nash leaked? If that’s all he’s showing, it makes any fuck—anybody look bad.”

  “You don’t have to censor yourself.”

  He shrugged. “Okay, but just remember, you asked for it. You recording now?”

  “You want to start the interview?”

  “Let’s get it over with.”

  She fiddled with the holobracer. “All right, Lieutenant. We are recording.”

  He leaned back, crossing his arms. “Fire away. What do you want to know?”

  “Let’s start with context. What can you tell me about the city and your mission?”

  “Confluence was a fuck-up and our mission was an inevitable consequence of that.”

  “Oh?”

  “After First Contact, it maybe seemed like a good idea to somebody to establish a joint colony with the Vash. Good public relations and all that. Thing is, the Vash discovered the system first. We just beat them to the planet. The Joint Settlement Agreement was a political compromise. It couldn’t last. The locals didn’t like it, especially not their locals.”

  “You’re referring to the Gerandi vas Hidano?”

  “Yeah. They said the planet rightfully belongs to the Vash. They started with protests outside the Terran Embassy that eventually escalated to violence. Bombs, shootings, infowar, the works. They wanted to kick us out.” He leaned forward. “You want to know the funny part?”

  “Sure.”

  “Under the Status of Forces Agreement, the Vash are supposed to police their own, and we take care of ours. But I’ve never heard of the Vashin Security Forces actually clamping down on the GvH. The Terran cops had to do the heavy lifting, arresting their cadre and handing them to the VSF. And a week later, those same assholes would be out on the street.”

  “Sounds like the VSF aren’t doing their jobs.”

  He nodded vigorously. “That’s right. They didn’t actually do anything until the Fist of Terra showed up. Compared to the GvH, they were amateurs. But suddenly the Vash said Confluence was in a state of emergency and sent in a battalion of Regulars as ‘peacekeepers’.”

  “And your battalion was sent in to match the Vashin force.”

  “Correct.”

  “How did you end up engaging Vash in the Vashin Section? I thought your battalion’s jurisdiction only covered the human areas.”

  “Close, but not quite. The city’s divided into three areas. Alpha Zone is the Lizzie Lair…” He shook his head. “Scratch that, don’t quote me on that. Alpha is the Vashin Section. Bravo is the Terran Section, where we are now. Charlie is downtown, where both races are intermingled. The idea is we keep to our section and they keep to theirs. In Charlie, the VSF and us are supposed to hold ‘joint parallel patrols’.” Horvan air-quoted the last three words.

  “I take it that didn’t happen.”

  “Yeah. They only ever show up in Charlie to chase the Fist of Terra or protect their own people. When hassaloki—that’s Vashin for ‘bandits’—from the GvH show up, poof.” He spread his hands. “They’re gone.”

  “That sounds rough. I read that your battalion were patrolling two-thirds of the city. Lieutenant Colonel Sewing told me he doesn’t have enough men to cover it.”

  “That’s right. There’s seven hundred of us to watch a population of three hundred thousand. We’re overstretched. If the Vash actually chipped in, we might be able to cope, but–”

  “Yeah.” She looked around, and leaned in. “You know, I've heard a few things about why they're not helping.”

  He mirrored her. “Yeah?”

  “Word is the Vashin Presidium doesn't so much mind the GvH. If the whole planet falls under Vash control, it’ll boost their popularity at home.”

  “You’re right. And it's more than that. The Presidium is supporting the GvH.”

  She blinked. “What?”

  “The GvH claims to be a grassroots movement, but most of the GvH leaders we captured came from other Vashin worlds. And somehow, the GvH has a steady supply of military-grade Vashin munitions even though the Vash have the tightest arms control regulations in the galaxy. Add that up, what do you get?”

  “I see. I’ll definitely look into this…. Now, did you see any signs of official Vashin government involvement on the day of the event?”

  “Not directly. But they didn’t do anything to stop it either. Not one VSF member showed up until it was all over.”

  “Do you want to talk about the incident now?”

  He reached down, producing a canteen from a thigh pocket, and uncapped it. He chugged down mouthfuls of clear liquid and sla
mmed the canteen on the table.

  “Yeah... I guess I do. Where should I start?”

  “Let’s start from the beginning.”

  Here’s what the Netcasts won’t tell you about being a soldier: ninety-nine percent of the time, you’re waiting for something to happen.

  We’d been lying in ambush for four hours. The Met services predicted five centimeters of snowfall today and the temperatures were pushing the bottom of the historical range. My combat suit was working overtime to keep my core temperature steady, but my extremities were freezing.

  As I flexed my fingers to keep the blood flowing into them, I peeked out the window, scanning the barren stretch of road before me. No signs of life, not yet.

  The Amin-Sayaski Highway connected Alpha to Bravo. We run security patrols down the highways at random times in the night. Lately, a cell of hassaloki were mining the roads, and they kept evading our patrols. Today, we were trying a different approach.

  Echo Company—that’s us—swept down the highway in our Mastiff Armored Personnel Carriers as usual, but at various points we dropped off infantry to ambush the cell. My platoon set up in the Kamin Picotechnology building, overlooking the ramps to the highway.

  “Lieutenant,” the platoon sergeant whispered. “It’s almost dawn, and still no sign of the threat.”

  “Give it thirty more minutes,” I told him. “If they don’t show up, we’re out of here.”

  We hadn’t exactly informed Kamin Picotech of our activities. We had to maintain operational security. They didn’t have any night security, and we didn’t break anything on the way in. If nothing happened by sunrise, we’d pack up and leave, with the locals none the wiser. Kamin works on Vashin hours, and nobody shows up until two hours after dawn.

  My platoon was scattered around the building. Two squads were watching the highway, one on security. I was with Sergeant Koh’s squad, who had the best view of the kill zone. The men were getting antsy, fidgeting under their camouflage blankets. I was starting to think this might be a dry hole. Not our first time, wouldn’t be our last.

  Then I saw the truck.

  It drove up the entrance ramp and halted at the top. Three Vash jumped out the back, carrying shovels. I signaled my radioman over, Lance Corporal Gordon, and got on the horn.

  “Echo Six, Echo Two here. We have a possible. A truck carrying three military-aged males. Males have shovels. Stand by.”

  Hassaloki use snow to conceal mines. Many bomber cells carry shovels with them. But shovels alone aren’t a good enough reason to shoot someone.

  “Echo Six copies,” Captain Garcia replied.

  We waited. The three Vash began digging a hole in the snow. A fourth one got out the passenger side, carrying an AMD-94. The official VSF rifle.

  “Echo Six, Echo Two. Another military-age male left the truck. He’s armed with a rifle.”

  “Roger that, Echo Two. You may engage at your discretion.”

  The three diggers dug all the way down to the road surface. Then they returned to their truck and broke out a large oval-shaped object wrapped in a tarp. They unwrapped it and gingerly set it in the hole. The object was an RMX-68 antitank mine. Again, VSF issue.

  Opening the window, I activated my suit’s loudspeaker and machine translator. “TERRAN ARMY! Drop your weapons and raise your paws!”

  The lookout fired at me.

  We fired back.

  They had a rifle. We had machine guns, grenades, squad precision lasers. Someone hit the mine and it exploded. The truck blew up. The Vash got blown to pieces. Literally.

  And it was over.

  “After the firefight, we moved in to secure the site for a field forensics team.” Horvan’s voice trailed off.

  “And?”

  He reached for the canteen. Slammed down more liquid and shook his head.

  “Biggest piece we found was a leg. We found five. Three left legs, two right legs. I mean, missing heads, we see that all the time. But there weren’t enough legs for the bodies and we looked and looked and we couldn’t find any more.”

  Horvan’s left eye twitched. “We found just one head. It was intact. I don’t know why. The blast had sheared it clean off but the head was pristine. He wasn’t much younger than some of my men. Than me.”

  “You sound regretful.”

  “Nah, I don’t regret killing him. None of us did. They were armed, they were trying to blow up some poor bastard, and there was no practical way to capture them. And they shot first too, don't forget that.”

  Anders nodded. “I see. If I recall correctly, the GvH claimed later that Terran forces killed four hatchlings. Is that right?”

  He snorted. “Yeah. Funny how the GvH didn’t mention that those ‘hatchlings’ were armed and getting ready to blow up innocent people. Maybe Vash people too.”

  “I hear you using the term ‘hatchling’ sarcastically. Why?”

  “They were young, but they were old enough to fight. In human terms, they were between the ages of 15 to 80.”

  “Are you certain of that? How could you tell?”

  “They all had neck frills. Small ones, but noticeable. Male Vash develop frills when they enter puberty. In their culture, males with frills are treated as adults and expected to take on adult responsibilities, even if they haven’t reached the age of majority. Which includes being a warrior. But the important thing is that they were armed. That made them legitimate targets.”

  “That makes sense. But then, how did the GvH broadcast spark the riot? You’d expect the locals would at least understand that males undergoing puberty would be doing the adult job of warfighting.”

  Horvan’s left eye twitched. “They called for vengeance. Blood for blood. Ancient Vash tradition, goes back to their pre-spaceflight era. We killed their kids, so they’re required to kill us. This mindset’s pretty common among the Vash frontier worlds.”

  Anders rested her chin on her hands. “Don't you think humans would have done the same?”

  “Yeah, we’re like them that way. Our Civil Affairs section tried to set the record straight, but the damned media gave the GvH all the airtime they wanted.”

  “Tell me what happened next. After forensics identified the bodies.”

  He frowned, leaning back. “It’s on public record.”

  “Not your side of the story. Not all of it.”

  Horvan crossed his arms. “I said everything I needed to say at the court martial. Andrew Nash twisted what I said and sold it to the press. How do I know you're not going to do any different?”

  She leaned in. “Look, I’m here to tell your story. Nash already told it the other way. There's nothing in it for me if I'm just repeating his narrative, right?”

  “Yeah, all right, that makes sense.” He bit his lower lip and shook his head. “What happened at the plaza was a real clusterfuck. I’m not sure I can put everything in the right order.”

  “Just tell me what you remember.”

  The field forensics team ran samples on biometrics scanners and cross-referenced with the city’s databases. The remains were traced to three different Vash, all of whom came from the same neighborhood in Bravo Zone. None of them came from the same clan, which meant a local ‘community leader’ probably recruited them. We needed to find him. Gessen Plaza was the neighborhood hub, so that was our first stop.

  We linked up with our Mastiffs and two guys from the Intelligence Corps en route to the plaza. The Intel guys did most of the talking. Our job was to provide security and conduct presence patrols alongside them. The idea behind presence patrols is to say, ‘We’re here to help, we won’t be intimidated by the bad guys, and we’d like to get to know you better’. Sometimes it even works.

  By the time we arrived at the plaza, it was what the locals called true dawn. Both suns were rising. Snowfall was slacking off and Vash were waking up.

  There weren’t many of them out and about yet. The Vash begin their day by listening to a short lecture from their elders for moral guidance. These day
s they do it over the Lattice, their version of our Net. As we walked the empty streets, the Intel guys monitored the Latcasts.

  Most of it was the usual bullshit. The Terrans have come to steal land that rightfully belongs to the Vash. Drive them from our planet, kill the race-traitors who assist the invaders, support our valiant freedom fighters, you know what I mean.

  Then some Latcasts started trending. A known GvH sympathizer, who is also a community leader, claimed that we had killed four hatchlings. Young ones who were helping the cause. They were shot in the back, then mutilated so they could never be buried whole. It was time to rise up and take revenge. Other GvH members delivered similar messages, calling for vengeance and retribution.

  The mood of the neighborhood…changed. I don't know how to describe it, it kind of feels like electricity building up in the air or something. There weren't very many humans and the ones we saw were looking to get off the streets. The merchants wouldn’t look at us. The folks who were usually friendly towards us seemed to have stayed home.

  An hour into the patrol, the Intel guys picked up more Latcasts. The locals were broadcasting the location of Terran patrols inside Bravo and calling for their heads.

  Which is to say, our heads.

  More Vash came out of their homes to confront us. And they were angry. Called us murderers and imperialists. We heard it all before, but never so much at once. The Latcasts had gone nova but Vash civvies don’t mobilize like that. There must have been local leaders organizing them. Had to be.

  The crowds got thicker and rowdier by the minute. The Intel guys managed to backtrace some of the propcasts. One of the shit-stirrers was in the central marketplace. We decided to go there and talk to him ourselves. We eased our way through the crowd, heading for the market, and that’s when we were attacked.

  “You were ambushed,” Anders said.

  “No shit,” Horvan said. “It’s all on the record–”

  Soft booms rolled in from the distance. Horvan froze, his eyes widening.

  “Is something wrong?” Anders asked.